This Internet Thing

Last Sunday at the dinner table Nana wondered aloud if the Internet is a good idea. She wasn’t exactly sure what the Internet is, but she thought she remembered reading something unpleasant about it in her morning newspaper. “What is this Internet thing I keep hearing about?” she asked. I didn’t know how to answer her.

As in so much of life, what you get from the Internet is what you bring to it. It is simultaneously the most revolutionary tool for communications and for learning since the Gutenberg Press, a fascinating method for wasting time, and a new way for people to disrupt each other’s lives. Certainly it is here to stay, and it will change our society in ways that we haven’t yet begun to fathom.

Continue reading This Internet Thing by Earl Gary Stevens, from his column, Talk About Learning, in the September-October, 1997 issue of Home Education Magazine. Read more of Earl’s great writing in back issues at our online archives.